Nostalgia overwhelmed me as I pulled into the quiet driveway of my parents’ suburban New Jersey home. It had only been a few weeks since my last visit, but it felt like longer—and there was always a welcome sense of familiarity.
Several memories played back like trailers for a movie as I took in the two dormers that popped out of the roof—one of which led directly into my childhood room—and guided my car to a stop behind my sister and brother-in-law’s SUV.
My little sister, Georgia, a toddler at the time, hightailing it across the front lawn—naked—while I’d chased after her, and my oversexualized parents made out on a lounge chair folded out in front of the garage.
My dad standing in the door and laughing as I’d walked my first date to the car, opened the door, and tried to sit her down directly on a box of condoms he’d placed there.
George coming home from masturbation camp—yeah, that’s a long story—and crying to me about murdering our mother as I’d sat next to her hip on my bed.
In the end, she hadn’t gone through with the murder, and I hadn’t been able to do anything to stop the tears, but we’d bonded that day. Somehow, the awkward, well-meaning doings of our parents quieted the normal sibling antagonism that lived between us and turned it into something more mature. Something that still teased and poked, but by and large, focused on understanding and love.
Lost in my thoughts, I startled when the storm door slammed open and a naked toddler came shooting out of it and onto the front lawn. I jumped into action, swinging out of my car door and leaving it open just as my frazzled brother-in-law Kline leapt from the front porch onto the grass and dropped to a squat, ready to corral her. I took the other side, and together, we herded my niece Julia like she was a lost calf and we were the cowboys.
As sweat broke out down the line of my back, I realized something: toddlers are basically just smaller versions of drunk adults, but cuter. But I wondered when the transition happened, when cute wasn’t quite so cute anymore. At what age do we expect them to dry out, go to rehab, that kind of thing?
I’m kidding, obviously.
But there’s no denying the similarities between a toddler and drunk twenty-one-year-old guy at a frat party are uncanny.
When Kline had her safely squirming in his arms, my mind drifted straight back to my trip down memory lane.
“Like mother, like daughter,” I remarked at the same time Kline said the exact same thing.
Both of us froze.
“What are you talking about?” we asked in unison again.
His face took on a carnal quality, and I recoiled.
Oh, gross. And awkward.
“Never mind,” I mumbled, blinking my eyes rapidly to try to scrub the mental image.
My sister and brother-in-law were one of those perfect pairs that made each other better. He was a brilliant businessman, loaded with more money than I could even fathom, and one of the humblest guys I’d ever met. She was just as brilliant, successful in her own right as a marketing director with the New York Mavericks, and the happiest part of his day.
That said, she was also a nutcase, and he was far too good at being her enabler.
“Where’s Gigi?” I asked, and his whole face lit up.
“Inside with her feet up.”
My eyebrows squished together. “Is she feeling okay?” She was pregnant with their second child, and as far as I knew, the fatigue hadn’t been hitting her too hard.
“Oh, yeah,” Kline remarked lasciviously, and once again, I was sorry I went there.
“Oh, gross. I was asking about morning sickness, not orgasms, for fuck’s sake. My mom is rubbing off on you.”
My mom, Dr. Savannah Cummings, was a sex therapist, and the scars of having a parent like her ran deep. I found my moments to enjoy the gifts her occupation had bestowed on me as a brother looking for ammunition against his sister and the like, but Kline, as an outsider, didn’t have the same personal traumas to slow down his enjoyment. Most people run from their crazy in-laws; he ran with them.
“Oh, come on. If I were really trying to torture you, I wouldn’t have protected you from the fact that Savannah has been in there trying to convince Georgie that, and I quote, ‘It’d be the most natural thing in the world for you to be her obstetrician.’”
Internally, I cringed. Externally, I cringed. In fact, it felt like Kline had just jabbed me in the back of the throat with his finger, and my gag reflex was doing nothing more than reacting accordingly—hacking cough, choking sensation, slight nausea.
I loved my career as a physician in obstetrics, but I’d sign up to flip burgers at the nearest fast-food joint if it meant avoiding doing vaginal exams on my sister. The mere thought was worse than that disgusting horror flick called The Human Centipede.
Seriously, if you’ve never seen that movie, don’t fucking see that movie.
That flick is more traumatic than the blue waffle and that “Two Girls One Cup” site combined.
Jesus. Don’t Google those either.
I immediately wanted to scrub my brain with acid bleach and found myself cringing again.
Kline grinned triumphantly. “Exactly.”
Honest to God, a vagina, in a professional setting, didn’t have much effect on me anymore. In a personal setting, say, three beers deep on a Saturday night in Manhattan, I was all about the effect it had on me—but that was another subject entirely. However, as well adjusted to the overwhelmingly intimate aspects of my job as I was, I still couldn’t get on board with being George’s regular OB. An emergency? I’d be elbow-deep in a heartbeat. Otherwise, my sister and I were just about close enough, thank you very much.
Done talking about my sister’s reproductive pleasure, capability, and organs, I stretched out my arms and wiggled my hands. Kline handed over my squirming niece immediately.
“Come on,” Kline called as he headed for the door, looking over his shoulder as I blew raspberries on my niece’s tiny stomach. “We better get inside so we don’t miss your big television debut.”
Butterflies danced in my stomach at the state of my life. Several months ago, a TV production company had approached me and two other doctors at the head of their departments at St. Luke’s Hospital and done their best to convince us to sign on to be a part of what would be a docuseries with several episodes about each of us. They’d decided to call it The Doctor Is In. I honestly thought they could have taken more creative liberties with the title, but I guessed keeping it professional and to the point wasn’t a bad approach either.
To me, it had sounded like a blast from the beginning. A way to spice up work, a little extra initiative, and maybe something I could show my kids someday—and use as an opening with women in the meantime.
Dr. Scott Shepard, head of the Emergency Department, had the same positive take on the opportunity, but Nick Raines, the newest addition of all of us to St. Luke’s and the head of Neurology, wasn’t so sure. Apparently, he had some ground to make up with his daughter, whom he’d been estranged from for most of her life, but with some pressure from us and the board of directors at the hospital, he’d caved. It’d be good publicity for the hospital as a whole.
If I was being honest, I was more excited about the publicity it’d give me…personally.
Grey’s Anatomy had taught me that the “hot doctor” was a thing.
Telling people you watch Grey’s Anatomy probably isn’t a hot doctor thing, my mind advised.
Julia started to thrash as soon as we stepped inside the door of my childhood home—after a quick detour to shut the door to my car—so I set her down without protest. Sometimes toddlers needed to be free to roam, and, for lack of better words, go apeshit.
“Willy!” my father yelled in greeting, charging toward me and the door and completely boxing Kline out of the way. He grabbed my face between his hands and pretended to kiss the air beside my head. This was new behavior, but it wasn’t entirely unexpected. My mom was always reading some article on love, affection, and the effect of said expressions on your kids. This was probably something she’d told him was good for the health of my sex life.
“I’m right here, Dad,” I muttered back, a smile on my face. “You don’t have to yell.”
He ignored me and kept right on booming. “You’re looking long today, son.”
Oh, good. Another odd behavior, but this one wasn’t at all new. The day I saw my dad and he didn’t have a penis joke waiting for me, I’d also be attending his funeral. Dick had purposely named me William so that we’d be forever bonded as father and son with Johnson-themed nicknames.
What? Isn’t that how your parents named you?
Still. Preparedness never softened my reaction. You can’t ever be ready for your parent to open the conversation with the state of your genitals. “Oh Jesus.”
Georgia buried her face in Kline’s chest behind Dick’s back to swallow her amusement. That wasn’t new either. If anyone knew what I was going through, it was her.
As soon as she composed herself and turned around, I gave her the eye. The one that said hey, these are your parents, too. She gave me a look back, but hers conveyed how happy she was to be sharing some of the humiliation.
She’d borne the brunt of it for most of our recent past. First, while I was in medical school and doing my residency, both endeavors that consumed nearly every hour of my days, and then when she got married to a man my parents adored, settled thirty minutes from their house, and then went and had a child.
She can only blame herself, if you ask me. Everyone knows grandchildren are a surefire way to ensure your parents have an all-access pass.
But she’d received more than one shipment of sex toys—even while on her honeymoon—from our mother in her tenure as humiliation buffer, so I guessed it was my turn.
“Come on, come on,” my mom said, shuffling us into the living room. “Your show is about to start, but I have snacks inside!”
“Snacks?” I asked hopefully. I hadn’t had anything to eat since this morning before work, and I was starving. Unfortunately, Kline’s laughter and a few slaps to my shoulder dampened my hope rather quickly.
“What? No snacks?” I asked.
“Oh, there are snacks,” Kline corrected. “Just you wait.”
“Get in here, you three!” Savannah yelled. My sister’s eyes gleamed with the knowledge of things to come.
I glanced at the door, vivid dreams of escape temporarily taking over my vision, but Georgia’s slap to the top of my arm snapped me out of it.
“Come on. Your television debut awaits.”
How weird. Me on television. Talk about a turn of life I didn’t really expect, seeing as I was a doctor.
Officially lured in, I followed my sister and brother-in-law down the hall. Julia shot out of a doorway and tripped me, but I managed both to catch myself before hitting the ground and avoid stepping on her.
“Whoa, JuJu. You almost took your Uncle Will out,” Kline teased with a smile as he scooped her up and into his arms.
“Boom boom, dah-dee,” she answered, and even I laughed.
Boom boom, indeed.
My mom and dad were waiting in the living room when we arrived, but that didn’t last long.
“Shoot, Dick. Come help me. I forgot the champagne out in the garage.”
“Champagne?” I protested. “It’s just a show, Mom.”
She ignored me, and so did my dad. He didn’t hesitate to jump up and follow her down the hall.
Georgia covered Julia’s ears, the constantly moving little girl now on her lap, and said the words we all knew to be true but didn’t want to say. “They’re definitely going to have s-e-x.”
I shrugged in affirmation. I couldn’t think of a time when Dick and Savannah weren’t sneaking off to have sex. And good for them, I guess. I just wished I knew a little less about it.
The smell of food caught my attention, and it didn’t take me long to zero in on its origin—the coffee table.
Ah Jesus.
“Are those vagina-shaped crescent rolls?” I asked, but I knew the answer. Goddammit, my parents are weird.
Kline nodded enthusiastically. “I helped shape them.”
“And those? What are those?”
“Deviled eggs with the tops on and a pickle speared garnish,” Georgia said, her eyes wide and innocent.
“And?”
She huffed and giggled a little. “A fertilized egg, obviously.”
“The Twizzlers?”
“Fallopian tubes.”
“See?” Kline said with a laugh. “I told you there were snacks.”
“Christ.”
Still…I was really hungry. And I do like eating pussy, I reasoned. Grabbing three bread vaginas, I popped the first into my mouth and searched the table for penis-shaped hot dogs. I really needed some protein, even if it was of questionable origin and phallic in shape.
“Ooh, it’s starting! Look, look!” George squealed excitedly. “Turn it up, Kline.”
He jumped to do as she bid, and I took a seat on the couch beside her and Julia as he did.
The music started, a fast tempo with a ton of B-roll footage of the hospital, its halls, and the busy streets of Manhattan. The intensity was exciting, so much so it made my heart beat a little faster. It flashed to the front entrance of St. Luke’s Hospital off of 59th Street, and then zoomed in the front doors and through the halls, stairwell, and around the corner to the front entrance of St. Luke’s Obstetrics and Gynecology at superspeed, almost as if they’d strapped the camera to a rocket.
But when the doors of my office opened, the actual camera shot faded and the graphic for the show formed, the last words to fade in: Dr. OB, and a picture of me.
Gigi squealed and squeezed my knee, and Kline gave me an encouraging smile from the chair beside us.
The camera shot picked up again as the cameraman walked down the hall lined with our exam rooms to my office at the end. As soon as my face filled the frame, a knot formed in my stomach. I wasn’t sure why; up until this point, I hadn’t felt anything but excitement. But in that moment, there was a strange sense of foreboding. I didn’t know if it was the expression on my face or just the uncertainty of it all.
But, it wouldn’t be long before I knew why.
I introduced myself and the practice and explained that I couldn’t wait to invite viewers into my world. It was all very innocuous. But then the image of me froze, a flirtatious smile on my face, and rapid-fire, so fast you could barely make out the words as they flashed, a list of everything in my world—or the one they intended to paint—scrolled across the screen.
The one I expected—medicine. One I encouraged—innovation.
And then, a whole litany of adjectives that were sure to haunt me for the rest of my life.
Sex.
Scandal.
Intrigue.
Secrets.
Lies.
I sat immobile.
The graphic for the show filled the screen again, and the indication of my segment, Dr. OB appeared at the bottom. Only this time, a ghost of the letters “s-c-e-n-e” filled the space right after.
Dr. OBscene. Dr. Obscene.
Me. They’re talking about me.
Several minutes of footage following me around the hospital ensued, but I was numb to it all. The only thing that penetrated was Kline jumping from his seat and Georgia leaving the room with my niece. Dick and Savannah came back at some point, and they could have yelled for all I knew. But to me, everything was silent.
My whole life was flashing before my eyes.
The camera shot followed me into the locker room of the hospital, something I’d had no clue they even had permission to do—an ignorance I had a feeling they intended if the shaky recording and barely cracked door were anything to go by—and continued filming as I pulled my shirt up and over my head and started to pull off my scrub pants. There was nearly a full ass cheek exposed by the time the shot panned away.
A Grey’s Anatomy-like scenario where they actually filmed you taking your clothes off and having sex in the on-call room wasn’t nearly as appealing in real life. I’d thought they’d follow me around, present me with opportunities to show off my expertise and show the difference I wanted to make in my patients’ lives—not belittle my intent with creative editing and show me getting naked instead of the emergency C-section I’d performed not even an hour earlier. There was a difference between looking hot and capable and looking inappropriate—and this crock of shit was definitely painting me as the latter.
Christ, my career was on the line here.
Before I even realized what I was doing, I had my phone out and in my hand, searching for the number of someone who would have some answers, and I really only had one question. What in the fuck was going on?
Settling on Tammy Schuler, a member of the board for St. Luke’s and one of the biggest advocates for all of the positives the show would bring to our lives, I hit Call and pressed the phone to my red-hot ear.
She answered on the second ring, and her voice was cautiously chastising. “Will, calm down.”
I hadn’t even said anything, but I guess that was the power of my fury as it radiated through the phone.
“Calm down?” I asked, deathly quiet. “You want me to calm down?”
“Listen—”
“They’ve got me on camera undressing, Tammy!” I exploded. “How the hell were they allowed to film in the locker room anyway? Where was Legal on this one?”
“They didn’t exactly detail in their contract that they’d be filming you undressing, Will.”
“Then let’s go after them! This is an invasion of all professional privacy and a complete misrepresentation.”
“Will…” She paused. “God, Will.”
“What?”
“They didn’t outline that they planned to do it on their side, but we didn’t outline that they couldn’t on ours. I’m sorry.”
“So…what? I’m just supposed to sit here and let this happen for the next twelve weeks? I thought this was a goddamn docuseries, not one ass cheek away from the start of a porno!”
“Our hands are tied for the next thirty-six, Will. We’ve checked with the lawyers, I assure you, but we have no legal recourse. Every single planned episode—yours, Scott’s, and Nick’s—will air.”
“Fucking shit.”
“Will.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. That’s not exactly professional language.”
She actually laughed a little, and I considered what kind of technology it would require to have my hand reach through the phone and strangle her. Have they invented it yet? Can my brother-in-law afford it? He’s fucking loaded, so I’m sure he can.
“No, it’s not, but it’s fine. I was just going to tell you the positive news.”
“I’m not really seeing how you can spin this one in a good direction, Tammy.”
“How about five hundred thousand hits in an hour?”
“What?”
“That’s how many people have visited the hospital website in the last hour.”
I rolled my eyes. “And? I’ve always thought of hospitals as one of those things that sell themselves. People get injured, they come. It’s not like they’re choosing a spa.”
“You’d think that, but you’re wrong. People do choose hospitals, Will, and as much as you don’t like this personally, people are choosing our hospital because of this show.”
“And they’re all checking in to the psych ward?”
Deep down, I knew she was right. People really did choose hospitals. I’d seen it enough in my time as a physician, but still…this was about me and I was pissed. Emotion sometimes skews rational thought.
“Will.”
I sighed. Goddammit. “Fine. I guess it is what it is.”
“It is.”
“Then you better keep me on salary until I’m dead, close, or convicted of an actual crime.”
It was her turn to sigh. “The hospital cannot actually promise to keep a job for you, but I can guarantee the circumstances have been noted.”
“My sacrifice has been noted.”
“Now you’re just being dramatic.”
Maybe she was right. Maybe I was being dramatic. Or maybe this really was the end of my life as I knew it. Either way, I said my goodbyes, hung up the call, and forced myself to go back into the living room to watch the rest of the show.
The truth was, as angry as I was with Tammy and the board, and as livid as I felt with the production company, neither of those had anything on the loathing I felt for myself. I’d been excited. Naïvely thinking the show would improve my social life, for fuck’s sake. Oh, you’re so impressive, Will, I’d thought women would say.
But the show had taken a direction completely different from what they’d pitched—a harrowing account from St. Luke’s most elite doctors—and turned it into a lighthearted romp on everything ethical and professional.
Unfortunately, with my guard down and my head up my ass, I’d given them the material. I’d been the man on camera, and there wasn’t anyone but myself to blame for that.
Goddammit.
On the edge of my seat, I watched with disgust as the man on the screen—me, apparently—said something bordering on offensive and winked…while doing a dilation check on a harmlessly pregnant woman…just before the show faded into the final commercial.
Good. God.
I didn’t even remember doing it, winking for the camera like that, and I certainly didn’t remember doing it with my hand inside of a woman. The camera had been right behind her head, and a gown was covering all the skin of her legs, but, for shit’s sake, it was never appropriate to wink at a woman while giving her such an intimate exam. I wonder if she’d felt uncomfortable? If she’d thought I was winking at her?
Even though I knew I’d never act that way without some kind of pseudo-reasonable explanation, panic and hysteria swirled inside me until the disbelief wore off and let them explode.
“I look like a predator!”
No woman was ever going to come near me again. Not for medicine and certainly not for sex. I was going to have to move. To somewhere remote. Without television. And live in a hut or something. Oh my God. No one is ever going to blow me again. I was going to be the male version of a spinster, but instead of cats, I’d just have a collection of pocket pussies.
Sweet Jesus, I am going to throw up.
“Don’t worry, Willy. If anything, this will probably up the ante on your female attention and dating life. Women are notorious for seeking out things that are bad for them,” my dad remarked.
Kline gave a low whistle, and Georgia stood up from her seat in affront. “Um, excuse me?”
“Dick,” my mom said. But being my mother, she said it through a goddamn chortle.
Being the center of such discord, I figured it was my familial duty to wade in. Plus, if I didn’t say what I was thinking soon, I feared I’d burst into something from Men in Black. “No, Dad. Crazy women seek out things that are bad for them. The smart ones run in the other direction.” My voice dropped to a dejected mutter. “Which is exactly what they’re going to be doing with me now. Jesus.”
“I bet no one is even watching,” Georgia chirped hopefully, trying to make me feel better through a backhanded insult. I’d spent all day hoping the opposite, but at this point, I wanted nothing more than for my sister to be right.
My phone, the opportunist, chimed tauntingly in my pocket. I half considered not reading the text message that beckoned, but in the long run, I wasn’t sure ignoring this little problem would actually make it go away. Instead, it might just make me a bigger fool.
My family continued to debate my now questionable eligible bachelor status in the background as I pulled my phone from my pocket and swiped to read the message without pausing to see who it was.
In hindsight, I probably should have taken the moment.
Thatch: Hot damn, son. You’ve been pretty good at hiding your freak-a-leek all these years. Cassie already has her legs in the air around the clock, trying to get pregnant again, but if that doesn’t work out, you’re officially our new doctor. Hell, even if it does. Her pussy makes all the others you see on a regular basis look like amateurs.
There it was. An endorsement from Thatcher Kelly, my brother-in-law’s best friend and one of the most ridiculous human beings ever born. He was an adolescent in a giant’s body, and he didn’t like things that didn’t have a big, obvious pair of tits prepared, just waiting to be suckled. He was the worst judge of normalcy and the exact opposite of my target demographic—and he liked the show.
I was fucked. Really and truly fucked.
My head fell back in frustration as my inner voice mocked me with the real truth. You aren’t fucked, Will Cummings. You’re never to be fucked again.